Former President Donald Trump's Manhattan hush money trial is being viewed in a totally different way abroad, German Der Spiegel reporter Marc Pitzke told MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace on Wednesday.
This comes as Trump is set to receive a ruling on whether he violated the gag order in the case, which charges him with business fraud in connection with his cover up payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election.
When it comes to Germany's relationship with the U.S., Pitzke said, "It's always this back and forth. And when Trump came into office, it sort of crystallized that. And it also — this balance got totally out of whack. He brought up the ugly — you talk about this on this show all the time. And it's, you know, it's really people after 2020, people said okay, we need a break. It's like you're in a dysfunctional relationship. You can't stop. You don't know how to get out, but you suffer. And it was the same way with Germany. We've been tied to you guys since World War II. You liberated us, but we resent you for it. There are all these different layers. And then Trump comes in. He personifies everything for us. So it's been — We're all tired."
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"Tell me what, for you, has jumped out?" asked Wallace. "Because as you said, we've been living with this for so long now. What, in terms of what you heard so far, surprised you?"
"Nothing really surprises me anymore about him," said Pitzke. "I was there when he came down that escalator. So every time there is like boiling frogs. Every time there is another thing happening, oh, okay, okay. What really surprises me now how the prosecution, how they put everything together. Like the opening statements were very tight, very short, but it was a narrative that you could follow. And for the first time we've talked about this for months. And since the arraignment, since the indictment a year ago, now we can really see this coming to life through people."
"Like, nobody knows David Pecker in Germany," he added. "But if you tell our readers that this is the guy who knows the secrets, this is the guy with the vault, the safe, then they — it's just amazing the depth of the alleged depravity behind all this. Like listening to David Pecker talk about this. We knew about 'catch and kill' and how it worked. We read Ronan Farrow and all that. But to really see how these stories were launched by Michael Cohen and by Trump, it's shocking. Nothing like this could ever happen in Germany, I hope. This guy would be in jail already in Germany."
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